Great Mosque of Tirana

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Advanced work on the mosque in August 2018

The Great Mosque of Tirana ( Albanian  Xhamia e Madhe e Tiranës ) or Namazgja Mosque ( Xhamia e Namazgjasë ) is a mosque under construction in Tirana , the capital of Albania . It should be the largest mosque in the Balkans and offer space for 4,500 worshipers. The building is being erected on the former Namazgja Square, an unused park between the Parliament and the Lana River .

prehistory

Since Tirana became the capital in 1920, there have been plans to build a central mosque for the Muslim majority of Tirana and Albania.

The implementation of the project did not begin until 1993 - after the fall of the communist dictatorship, during which Enver Hoxha declared the Socialist People's Republic of Albania the “first atheistic state in the world” in 1967 and had many churches in the country destroyed. In 1992 a cornerstone was laid in Albanian and Arabic next to the parliament. However, the construction was prevented by the then Roman Catholic Parliament President Pjetër Arbnori (born Filip Toma ). In the center of Tirana, a Roman Catholic cathedral was built in the 1990s and an Albanian Orthodox cathedral in the following decade .

Despite the large number of believers, Tirana does not have a large central mosque to this day. The Old Mosque of Tirana was destroyed in 1944. The small Et'hem Bey mosque from the late 18th century on Skanderbeg Square , the main square, only has space for 60 worshipers and does not meet the needs. Only smaller, decentralized mosques are available to the faithful. Squares and streets such as the Boulevard Dëshmorët e Kombit are often used for prayers during the two most important Islamic holidays - the Feast of the Sacrifice and the Feast of the Breaking of the Fast . Rain always led to problems. Muslim associations complain about discrimination against the majority: while church buildings were being completed, the construction of a central mosque was always an empty promise by the respective governments.

A project for a central mosque behind the Palace of Culture was never realized due to disputes over the redesign of downtown Tirana between the two largest parties - the Democratic Party and the Socialist Party . The project would have included a very modern mosque and a “Museum of Religious Harmony” by a Danish architecture firm.

The largest mosque in Albania to date is the Bejtyl Evel Mosque of the Ahmadiyya on the outskirts, the largest in the Balkans is the King Fahd Mosque in the Bosnian-Herzegovinian capital Sarajevo .

realization

Great Mosque of Tirana (Tirana)
Great Mosque of Tirana
Great Mosque of Tirana
Map of Tiranas

21 years after the first laying of the foundation stone, in April 2013 - on the birthday of the Prophet Mohammed - an agreement was signed by the government, the city administration of Tirana and the Muslim community to build a new mosque. At the second laying of the foundation stone, Selim Muça , the then Chairman of the Muslim Community, the then Prime Minister Sali Berisha ( PD ) and the then Mayor Lulzim Basha ( PD ) were present.

In October 2014, the then first government cabinet of Edi Rama issued the necessary building permit. The Deputy Prime Minister Niko Peleshi ( PS ) justified the construction with the creation of jobs.

Construction progress in December 2016

Although the construction work was supposed to start in January 2015, the laying of the foundation stone did not take place until May 13, 2015 in the presence of the then Albanian President Bujar Nishani , the Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his wife Emine Erdoğan . The mosque should be completed within three years by 2018. The work was delayed repeatedly. Sometimes there were problems with the financing of the 35 million euro building, and in spring 2020 work had to be stopped, for example due to the COVID-19 pandemic . The building is being carried out by the Muslim Community of Albania with financial support from the Turkish Foundation for Religious Affairs (which was headed by Mehmet Görmez , the chairman of the Bureau for Religious Affairs ). Niko Peleshi stated that the Albanian government would also support its part.

A domed building in the classic Ottoman style with four 50 meter high minarets and two prayer rooms for 2,000 and 2,500 worshipers respectively will be realized . The dome will be around 30 meters high. The mosque is said to have an area of ​​less than 10,000 square meters. A conference room for 332 people, a library, an exhibition room, a restaurant, a room for breastfeeding for mothers, an elevator for the disabled, work rooms and ten classrooms for studying the Koran are part of the facility.

Museum of Coexistence

An important annex is the two-storey "Museum of Coexistence", which deals with the religious coexistence of different religions, which according to the then Deputy Prime Minister Niko Peleshi was a "national value". Since the museum was planned on the same property, the necessary resolutions were a prerequisite for the construction of the mosque. In the plans, it looked like a traditional Ottoman half-timbered house ( konak ) .

Web links

Commons : Great Mosque of Tirana  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Ervin Shkulaku: Balkanlar'ın en büyük camisi Arnavutluk'ta inşa edilecek. (No longer available online.) In: Zaman . November 20, 2014, archived from the original on January 10, 2015 ; Retrieved January 4, 2015 (Turkish).
  2. ↑ a b c Besar Likmeta: New Mosque Plan Catches Albania Muslims Off Guard. In: Balkan Insight . November 22, 2010. Retrieved September 20, 2017 .
  3. ↑ Nadia Pantel: Balancing in Tirana. In: Jetzt.de - Süddeutsche Zeitung . January 2, 2015, accessed January 4, 2015 .
  4. ↑ a b c Tirana en büyük camii Diyanet'ten. (No longer available online.) In: İstanbul Ajansı. October 24, 2014, archived from the original on January 5, 2015 ; Retrieved January 4, 2015 (Turkish).
  5. ^ Tirana Mosque and Museum of Religious Harmony by BIG. In: Archi Scene. May 5, 2011, accessed September 20, 2017 .
  6. ↑ a b Elona Gjylmi: Namazgja mosque, Berisha: The right denied what made just. (No longer available online.) In: Albanian Screen TV. April 20, 2013, archived from the original on January 4, 2015 ; accessed on January 4, 2015 .
  7. ^ A b Construction of the Mosque of Namazgja and Employment Fund. Government of Albania, November 19, 2014, accessed April 14, 2019 .
  8. ↑ Xhamia e madhe në nisë në janar, përfundon për 3 vjet. In: Zëri. January 4, 2015, accessed April 21, 2018 (Albanian).
  9. ^ President Erdoğan Attends Groundbreaking Ceremony of Tirana Namazgah Mosque. Retrieved June 3, 2015 .
  10. ↑ Turkey is building the largest mosque in the Balkans. In: trt.net.tr. Turkish Broadcasting Corporation, March 6, 2018, accessed March 7, 2018 .
  11. ↑ Xhamia e Namazgjasë end pezull. In: TV Klan. May 23, 2020, accessed May 24, 2020 (Albanian).

Coordinates: 41 ° 19 ′ 32 ″  N , 19 ° 49 ′ 27 ″  E